Amelia Earhart: Lady Lindy by Ann Hood

see the girls anymore.
    His feet kicked against the weeds and muck below, while his arms dog-paddled to keep his head above the water.
    What in the world is that sound?
Felix wondered as the roar became louder and nearer.
    He craned his neck, but all he could see was more river up ahead.
    The water around him started to get frothy. And, he realized, it was swirling like the water in a whirlpool.
    Felix blinked.
    â€œHelp!” he called again, now moving his arms and legs even faster in an attempt to fight the current.
    The current that was pulling him straight into the fastest-moving rapids Felix had ever seen.
    That roar was the rapids rushing and swirling.
    And no matter how hard Felix fought, the rapids were winning.

CHAPTER 8
    FIRST FLIGHT
    T he rapids grabbed on to Felix and threw him around hard. He felt like laundry in the washing machine getting bounced and tossed, the water everywhere, churning all around him. He knocked into rocks. He banged against pieces of wood floating past. Holding his breath for so long made his chest ache and burn.
    Just when he thought he had to give up, that his lungs would burst if he didn’t get air, the rapids lifted Felix up and spat him out.
    He landed in shallow water, on his back, with a thud.
    Gasping, Felix let his exhausted body sink into the muddy bottom. The river water, calm now, spilled over him in gentle ripples. But the sound of the rapids still roared in Felix’s ears, mixing with the sounds of his own panting.
    A pigtailed shadow fell over him.
    â€œWhat are you doing all the way down here?” Meelie demanded.
    Felix could only shake his head and swallow more air.
    â€œDon’t tell me you don’t know how to swim, either?” Meelie asked, disgusted.
    â€œI. Can. Swim,” Felix managed to get out.
    Meelie looked past him, toward the thundering rapids. Then her gaze settled back on Felix, her eyes widening.
    â€œDid you just go down Dead Man’s Leap?” she asked.
    Perfect name for it,
Felix thought as he nodded his reply.
    â€œYou must be the bravest boy in the world,” Meelie said, plopping down in the mud and water right next to him. “I admire bravery,” she said. “Like my mother climbing Pike’s Peak.”
    If he could have found his voice, Felix might have told Meelie that it was stupidity, not bravery, that brought him to Dead Man’s Leap. And sheer luck that got him through those rapids.
    â€œSomeday I’m going to do something brave and the whole world will know about it,” Meelie said.
    She was maybe the most confident person Felix had ever met. Even more sure of herself than Bitsy Beal. And kind of a braggart, too. But she was so cute with those freckles and that big, toothy smile, that Felix almost didn’t mind her boasting.
    Meelie leaned close to him, like she was about to tell him a secret.
    â€œDo you think you almost died in there?” she asked, her voice soft.
    â€œFelt. Like. It.”
    Meelie’s eyes sparkled. “Someday I’ll do something brave and almost die, and then I’ll tell everyone how I survived.”
    Felix took a big breath. Finally, he seemed to have enough air in his lungs.
    â€œDid you catch any perch?” he asked, his voice hoarse.
    â€œWe did!” Meelie said. “Lots!”
    She stood, reaching her hand down to help Felix to his feet.
    He let her pull him up out of the muck, and held on to her as they walked along the river, his knees still shaking from his time in Dead Man’s Leap.

    â€œThis,” Meelie announced, “is our museum.”
    Maisie sighed, unimpressed.
    In three large jars on a table at the end of the porch were bugs of some kind. She and Felix had been in Des Moines for almost a month and the perfect Midwestern life Maisie had envied when they first arrived had grown dull. Sometimes, Meelie hitched James Ferocious to a doll carriage and made him walk around the neighborhood, Pidge running ahead